- published: 12 May 2011
- views: 4791134
Waste (also known as rubbish, trash, refuse, garbage, junk, and litter) is unwanted or useless materials.
Waste is linked to people development. Litter refers to waste disposed of improperly.
"Wastes are materials that are not prime products (that is products produced for the market) for which the generator has no further use in terms of his/her own purposes of production, transformation or consumption, and of which he/she wants to dispose. Wastes may be generated during the extraction of raw materials, the processing of raw materials into intermediate and final products, the consumption of final products, and other human activities. Residuals recycled or reused at the place of generation are excluded."
Under the Waste Framework Directive (European Directive 75/442/EC as amended), the European Union defines waste as an object the holder discards, intends to discard or is required to discard.
There are many waste types defined by modern systems of waste management, notably including:
There are many issues that surround reporting waste. It is most commonly measured by size or weight, and there is a stark difference between the two. For example, organic waste is much heavier when it is wet, and plastic or glass bottles can have different weights but be the same size. On a global scale it is difficult to report waste because countries have different definitions of waste and what falls into waste categories, as well as different ways of reporting. Based on incomplete reports from its parties, the Basel Convention estimated 338 million tonnes of waste was generated in 2001. For the same year, OECD estimated 4 billion tonnes from its member countries. Despite these inconsistencies, waste reporting is still useful on a small and large scale to determine key causes and locations, and to find ways of preventing, minimizing, recovering, treating, and disposing waste.